LSEI on Friday

[Guest guest]

Hi all,

I want to tell you all what happened to me on Friday when I went for my 3rd lumbar steroid epidural injection. First of all, my mom was coming to drive me home and spend the night to make sure I was okay before leaving on Saturday and my dad was driving through on Friday, so on Thursday (the day I told you all I tried to be superwoman), I had made lunch for us all so we could eat after the injection was done. Well, I got up on Friday morning thinking that I knew I was going to have a big lunch so I would eat a small breakfast. Went straight the coffee maker just like everyday, drank my 2 cups of coffee and ate a half a bowl of Special K. Get to the pain clinic and the first thing they ask me is have you had anything to eat? WHAT WAS I THINKING? This IS the 3rd one I was getting and I KNEW you are not supposed to eat or drink 6 hours before the procedure.

I don't know where my mind was when I got up on Friday. Well, they tell me they can't give me an IV for sedation since I ate at 6 a.m. (It was 10 a.m. then). Ok, they said they could do it under local and he would rub something on my back to numb it before giving the injection. I told them I would try. Either that or reschedule and my mom had to drive nearly an hour to get there plus I had to take another day off work for the procedure and I am really running out of paid time off. Well, the longer I sat on the table waiting for him to get in the room, the more nervous I got. By the time they got in there to do the procedure, I was sitting on the bed shaking and they asked me was I cold? I said no, I am nervous. Blood pressure was 145/90 (not too high, but high for me. Mine is usually around 118 to 120/60). He said if he gave me injection in this shape, I would pass

out, so I could either reschedule or I could go to the hospital and he would be over there at 1 p.m. and he could do it there as outpatient surgery. Ok, I opted for the hospital like I said so my mom would not have driven all the way for nothing and I wouldn't have to miss another day of work, which would be without pay. I get to the hospital at 11 a.m. They put me in the preop suite and immediately start an IV (which I totally have ANOTHER huge bruise from). After about 1/2 bag of normal saline, I had to make 3 or visits to the restroom and by then it was 12 noon. Between 12 noon and 1 p.m, I started watching the clock on the TV again, getting more nervous by the minute, as the last injection I had in the office they did sedate me, but there was a lot of pressure and I had about 4 or 5 days of really bad back pain after it was over and I wasn't looking forward to it. At 1 p.m., they

wheel me up to the OR and put me in a holding area. Turns out, he only has 2 outpatient epidurals that day. Lucky for me (HA!!), I get to actually sit straight across from the OR suite with actual WINDOWS on the door and I can watch the entire procedure done on the lady who went in before me. First thing I notice is that the first 2 procedures I had in the office were done with me sitting on the edge of the table with my back exposed. This one he was going to use the fluoroscopy machine since I was going to the hospital and he could get a deeper injection so I see the lady before me is lying on her stomach. Well, seemed like 5 minutes after she went in there, she gets wheeled out and asks the nurse, When is he going to give my injection? I am thinking, great this is going to be a breeze. Ok, I will be alright then, sedated, in and out and I can deal with the stiff back and soreness for a week when I get

home. NNNOOOTTTTT!!!

This is how my procedure went: They wheel me into the OR suite. I am fully awake. They ask me to get on the procedure table with 2 pilllows underneath my stomach, kind of in a jack-knife position (they said). Felt more like doggy style to me!! They (before any sedative), they throw my gown up exposing my bohunkus to everyone in the room which was about 4 or 5 people). Then the doc gives me another pillow and says I can hug it if I want, which actually turned out my head was buried in it and I couldn't breathe. I look over at the monitor and by now, my BP is up to 156/110. Then I see the doc pick up a vial and I bury my head in the pillow again and I hear him ask the nurse, do you see that? She said, yeah, looks like the seal is broken. He said, well I guess it is good. Then he say to me, here is your first sedative. As you he gave it to me my heart started racing so fast, I was

just thinking, this is it. This is the end for me. I am a goner!! Then he says, here is the second sedative. As soon as he gave me the second one, my head pops straight up and I am EVEN MORE WIDE AWAKE, looking around the room and he starts shoving a needle in my back which I felt every inch of and I burst into tears, then he starts yelling, picture, picture, give me a picture, and injects me another time, then says ok, I am done. They wheel me out into the recovery suite and I promise you I had less pain delivering all 3 of my children if you added all the pain together from the 3 of them. We get in the recovery room, and the attendant who wheeled me in there says, there is no nurse. So, she leaves me there crying with no one in the room (I mean no one, no healthcare providers and no patients, just me with pain and tears). Finally she brings in a nurse and she says, Hi I am I am going to be your

nurse. Why are you crying? The attendant tells her I just had an epidural and it was more painful than I thought it was going to be. The nurse says, HUM??, we usually don't have to give Dr. Aziz's patients a sedative!! Going back to my first injection in the office, I was told the 3 main side effects to watch for are sudden excruciating headache (which would mean spinal fluid leak), numbness in the back or radiating down the legs (which could indicate possible paralysis), or blood leakage (internal hemorrhage). No more than 5 minutes after I was given the second sedative, I got what felt like the worst migraine I have ever had in my life. Told the nurse when she finally got there, and she says, ok, we are going to let you go in about 20 minutes!!! Then 5 minutes later, my back starts getting numb and my whole right side goes numb. I asked her was my side supposed to go numb like that (it didnt' the first 2

times). She sayt, well it might cuz he did inject your spine!! Still, they don't call the doctor or anything. They wheeled me back downstairs and I get down there and my BP is still 136/90, still have a headache pounding, but the numbness was a little better. It had gone from being on the entire right side to just my right thigh and calf. They said if I could wiggle my toes and stand on my foot, I could go home. Still no one calls the doctor. I am still in tears and my mom is throwing a fit saying she is not letting me leave there until she knows I am okay. Then the nurse comes in insisting I drink something. I told her I didnt' want anything. (I was actually just thinking, ge me the hell outa here!!) Finally I gave in and she brought me some water. As soon as I drank a sip I felt like I was going to throw up. The nurse says, oh, that's not good. Then she looks at my mom and

says, well, you can go get the car and drive around and I will wheel her out and she can go home.

That was it. My third and last epidural injection I will EVER have in my life!! I don't care if I have to take 50 pain pills a day. I will NEVER, EVER, EVER go through that again. I have cried the entire weekend. I can still barely walk and can't bend over much at all. My back is still throbbing. My boyfriend, , called last night and I was still crying with pain. He told me to call an ambulance or go to the ER, but I didn't want to go back to that hospital for anything, so I just doubled up on my Lorcet to try and make it through the night and slept on a heating pad. I have probably slept maybe 5 hours all weekend (I doubt it) and I am totally miserable. said I thought they were supposed to be giving you something to help you not make you worse. Yeah, me, too. I think I am going to call the pain clinic in the morning (as my discharge instructions said to follow up

with the pain clinic), and I am going to tell them I am going to find another pain physician and I won't be back.

I am sorry this is so long. You all are my best friends and I just had to vent!! I felt like he didn't give me any sedative at all for this procedure even knowing how nervous I was about the procedure anyway. Why didn't he just knock me out and then do it? I am still sitting here in tears even as I type this just reliving it on the PC. I have never in my life had so little faith in a physician. I thought my lung biopsy was a nightmare but it was a party compared to this!!

Thank you all so much for listening and I don't know what I would do without you!! I am so happy I am still here to even be typing this cuz I definitely thought Friday was going to be my last day anywhere!!

Love you all and I hope you have a wonderful rest of the weekend. We have had tornado warnings all night last night and all day today. Hopefully the storms will ease up soon. It is definitely a day I feel like sleeping all day, but am still in too much pain to sleep.

CaroOSTEOARTHRITIS 2002, COPD 02/06, IPF 08/07, UIP 01/08, RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS 03/08 SJOGREN SYNDROME 07/08 POLYMYOSITIS/DERMATOMYOSITIS 03/09 CANCER OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN 03/09Mississippi